Rejtman, Piñeiro and Mascaro to Premiere at Locarno

The Locarno Film Festival has announced the full lineup for its 67th edition which includes the world premiere of two films from Argentina and one from Brazil in its official competition: Martín Rejtman's Dos disparos / Two Gun Shots (pictured left), Matías Piñeiro's La Princesa de Francia / The Princess of France and Gabriel Mascaro's August Winds / Ventos de Agosto.

Rejtman's long-awaited feature film Two Gun Shots is an ensemble film about Mariano, a 16-year-old boy, who without any apparent reason, shoots himself twice, but survives. It then records the somewhat comically bathetic consequences of the event, the biggest of which perhaps is that the family dog finds a new home. Rejtman, one of the founding figures of the New Argentinean cinema of the late nineties is known for his films Silvia Prieto (1999) and The Magic Gloves (2003).

Also from Argentina, Matías Piñeiro's will be presenting The Princess of France (pictured right), the third installment of his Shakespearean project. A year after his father’s death in Mexico, Victor returns to Buenos Aires with a twofold mission. On the one hand, he brings with him a new project for his former theater company; on the other, he abandons his part as The Princess of France and takes up a new role in front of five actresses who know him all too well, but who don´t know that time to work will soon become a time to think again about lost loves.

Brazilian director Gabriel Mascaro's August Winds (pictured below) follows Shirley has left the big city to live in a small seaside town and look after her grandmother. She drives a tractor in a local coconut plantation and is having a fling with Jeison, who also works on the farm, and who dives for fish on the high seas. Amidst the storms that invade the region in the month of August, a wind researcher, who registers the sea breezes in the Intertropical Zone of Convergence, arrives in the town. The high tides and the growing winds mark the following days of the inhabitants of the village weaving a poetic narrative on the duel between life and death, the Wind and the Sea.

Other Latin American film announced to participate this year at Locarno are the Uruguayan film Los enemigos del dolor by Arauco Hernández, the Colombian film Los hongos by Oscar Ruiz Navia, and the Mexican film Navajazo by Ricardo Silva in the Concorso Cineasti del presente competition for first or second feature films. The Brazilian film Power of Affections by Helena Ignez will be screened out of competition. 

Additionally, four Latin American films will be screened in the festival's Signs of Life section for experimental films: Clenched Fists by Pedro Diogenes, Ricardo Pretti, & Luiz Pretti from Brazil, The Gold Bug by Alejo Moguillansky and Favula by Raúl Perrone, both from Argentina, and The Absent by Mexican director Nicolás Pereda.

The 67th edition of the Locarno Film Festival will take place August 6-16 in Switzerland.